Secretary of Defense Robert Gates described the 400,000 surveys emailed to active and reserve troops about “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” as “very important,” telling reporters at a briefing this afternoon that the he personally “suggested that they double the size of the sample.” “The original proposal was to sample 100,000 active troops and 100,000 in the reserve component and I strongly suggested that they double the size of the sample,” Gates said. “I wanted a significant percentage of the force to have an opportunity to offer their views on this.”

He stressed that “it is very important for us to understand from our men and women in uniform the challenges that they see” and explained that the survey would “help us prepare better to implement those changes when and if the law is changed.” Gates also pushed back against SLDN’s warnings that LGB service members could inadvertently out themselves by taking part in the questionnaire and promised that the results would remain confidential:

GATES: I would say that this survey is a very important element of this effort, in part because while General Ham and General counsel J. Johnson have talked to thousands of troops and dozens of military facilities, and we have gone several tens of thousands of comments and views by email in response to the request for people’s thoughts on this, this size sampling is obviously the most significant element of getting the views of the troops…I am aware there is at least one group that has suggested that gays and lesbians in the service not fill in the report….I strongly encourage gays and lesbians who are in the military to fill all the forms. We have organized this in a way to protect their privacy and confidentiality of their responses through a third-party, and it is important that we hear from them as well as everybody else.

Watch it:

Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Admiral Mike Mullen added that the survey is “going to be able to give us objective information with respect to the responses from the people that we care about the most,” but also described DADT as “a law that needs to be changed.” “It really needs to be changed from that perspective.”

Many repeal advocates have questioned the rationale behind subjecting the policy and the rights of gays and lesbians to a poll. It’s also unclear why the survey asks soldiers about whether the policy should be repealed, since the Pentagon has insisted since February that the study would focus on how, not whether, the policy should be repealed.

Change.org’s Michael Jones notes that the Presbyterian Church may soon become the largest U.S. Christian denomination to permit same-sex marriage. Church leaders meeting for their national convention in Minneapolis this week are preparing to vote to change the definition of “marriage” in their “Directory for Worship” from between “a man and a woman” to between “two people.”

The vote comes after the Special Committee to Study Issues of Civil Union and Christian Marriage issued a report recognizing that civil unions are not equivalent to marriage and expressed concern for the children of gay families, despite marital status. The full Committee of the General Assembly voted 47-8-2 to change the definition and it will come before the full General Assembly at around 7:30pm today.

Below are some of the proposed changes:

“Marriage is a gift God has given to all humankind for the well-being of the entire human family. Marriage is a civil contract between a woman and a man. For Christians marriage is a covenant through which a man and a woman two people are called to live out together before God their lives of discipleship. In a service of Christian marriage a lifelong commitment is made by a woman and a man the couple to each other, publicly witnessed and acknowledged by the community of faith.”

The document also argues that “to exclude an entire population of the church, namely same-gender couples, from the privilege of Christian marriage denies these persons the pastoral care they desire for fulfilling their service to God“:

While it has always been the case that persons authorized to conduct services of Christian marriage may not be required to marry a couple against their conscience and better judgment (Book of Order, W-4.9002b), to bind the conscience of ministers and commissioned lay pastors by forbidding them to conduct a legal marriage that they have prayerfully considered would be an unjustified interference in the exercise of pastoral care. Excluding same-gender couples from the privilege of Christian marriage where it is legally authorized undermines the peace, unity, and purity of the church. Section W-4.9000 was written and adopted before any state created the possibility of marriage between two persons of the same gender. The call of the prophets and the Word of God summon us to declare the holiness of the gift of marriage for all faithful couples, regardless of gender.

If the change is approved by the General Assembly, it will then go to the 173 regional chapters, which will consider the question over the next year. Once a majority vote in favor of the new definition, it will become part of the Presbyterian constitution. Currently, only the Unitarian Universalists, the United Church of Christ, and some Quaker churches recognize same-sex marriages.

Yesterday, the Pentagon emailed 400,000 surveys to American troops seeking their views on the impact of repealing DADT, but some advocacy organizations are already warning gay and lesbian members against filling out the questionnaire. Servicemembers Legal Defense Network (SLDN) has issued the following release:

A number of service members have contacted SLDN to seek guidance on surveys concerning the repeal of ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell — the discriminatory law barring gay and lesbian service members from serving with integrity. At this time SLDN cannot recommend that lesbian, gay, or bisexual service members participate in any survey being administered by the Department of Defense, the Pentagon Working Group, or any third-party contractors. While the surveys are apparently designed to protect the individual’s privacy, there is no guarantee of privacy and DOD has not agreed to provide immunity to service members whose privacy may be inadvertently violated or who inadvertently outs himself or herself. If a service member still wishes to participate, he or she should only do so in a manner that does not reveal sexual orientation.

According to the American Forces Press Service, “troops can log into http://www.defense.gov/dadt with their common access card to provide their input. This site is not confidential; however, directions from the site, as well as in the survey, are provided for members who wish to continue a ‘confidential dialogue’ with non-Defense Department members of the working group…[o]nce servicemembers enter the confidential site, they will be given an untraceable PIN number they then can use to log on from any computer.”

In May, Joe Mirabella from the Bilerico Project pointed out that the entire idea of surveying troops anonymously (or not completely anonymously) could “invite the worst kind of hate, anonymous homophobia.” “I’ve had the opportunity to write for a variety of sources. When I write for sites with a broad audience, anonymous comments can be downright hateful. On one blog I write for, I have a pack of 5 or 6 potential people…who takes every opportunity they can to fill my comment space with anti-gay hate.” Something very similar could happen with this survey, particularly if gay and lesbian troops decide not to participate in it. But deliberately silencing LGB troops could very well distort the entire study and provide ammunition for those who seek to maintain the policy.